'Awful, awful, awful," one minister said just in from the doorsteps. "I felt we were holding on last week and then it just collapsed. Prescott was the last straw." Another felt he had to apologise to local activists. "When I arrived at Labour headquarters in one city I had to say, 'I'm from the cabinet and I'm really, really sorry.' I felt ashamed in front of good people running a good council. They were on their eighth leaflet drop, proud of their council. What could I say to them?" A third minister said, "It was so utterly dreadful out there that it was pointless campaigning. How did we let this happen?" Some key London wards have asked cabinet ministers to stay away.

One cabinet minister put it graphically: "Our moral authority has collapsed. It's everything from Cherie's hair to cash for peerages, from Tessa's offshore mortgages to John Prescott's trousers. They think we abuse power and it's no good listing all we have delivered. It only makes them rage. They accuse us of arrogance and corruption and it leaves you silenced."

As each new crisis eclipses the last, leaving no fewer than seven cabinet ministers in some trouble, their one comfort is in finding no great enthusiasm for Tories or Lib Dems either. The won't-votes or the anything-but-Labour voters are motivated by a negative push factor away from Labour with little positive pull towards anyone else. Expect the lowest turnout ever, according to seasoned observers. The Institute for Public Policy Research is dead right to call for compulsory voting, but this is hardly the week for Labour to press it.

The main parties may be close in national polls, but more Tories will vote: a BPIX poll of certain voters on Thursday gives the Tories 35% to Labour's 26%. Labour may lose six London boroughs, with Camden in some peril too. Pollsters even ponder Labour losing Barnsley, Hartlepool, Warrington and Wigan. "You'd have laughed a few years ago if I'd even breathed the possibility," says Professor John Curtice.

So what can rescue Labour on Friday morning? The prospect of a reshuffle does not raise many spirits. It may be necessary if Clarke is forced out by some horrendous crime committed by one of the 288 criminals who went missing after he knew about the deportation failure. Otherwise, most reckon he is still the best man to get some grip on his hydra-headed department. But what good to Labour would be the promotion of eager Blairite Hazel Blears, deadly on-message Jim Murphy or grim trusty Hutton - let alone the Milburn and Byers Rosencrantz and Guildenstern? A night of the long knives spilling the blood of others would leave a nasty stench, for who is responsible for most of these problems? Tony Blair himself.

Even if he opted to bring in the brightest and best - Ed Balls, Ed Miliband, Vera Baird, John Denham, Angela Eagle, David Chaytor, Tony Wright and other bypassed talents - it would smack of desperation. It might work if he were sitting down with Gordon Brown to draw up a joint transitional government - but there is resolutely, obstinately no sign whatever of that. Inside the stale air of the bunker, refreshment and renewal are not available. Yet the irony is that Labour remains strong in everything that should matter, from the economy to the good underlying results of most departments.

Something in the air changed last week. The Brown/Blair stalemate may now be over, if the party refuses to allow another Blair attempt at toughing it out. The shock of what MPs are confronting on the doorsteps is something new. "Even the most loyal Labour voters look embarrassed and look away. Others just laugh. Now, I've never had that before," says one leading MP. An erstwhile moderate said this: "It can't go on. Even if the results are not catastrophic, every MP and minister who has been out there knows this has to stop now before it's too late. Tony Blair has to say he'll go soon, and the conference is the right time for a decent handover." Shouldn't he stay to see through the worst of the NHS, education and Home Office crises? "No, there is no chance of putting anything right now without a new agenda set out by someone new. They won't listen to another word from us now."

The party Tony Blair deliberately affronted is seething, still smarting from the way the education white paper was slapped at them, take it or leave it. Many MPs fear a heavy local fallout from NHS reforms they feel they were barely consulted over. Blair drove the Home Office to push ID cards and contentious terror laws, yet it failed at basic law-and-order housekeeping.

Ministers know how hard good administration is: targets do drive progress. But they also know how often Tony Blair's eye-catching announcements of near-impossible targets tripped the system. Go right back to 1997 with the target to cut every infant class size to 30 children: billions were wasted on needlessly cutting class sizes in high-achieving Tory areas to hit a fixed number, not an outcome. His eye-watering targets to cut asylum seekers led to switching staff from deporting prisoners. Waiting list times that are too tough are damaging other NHS services. It takes consultation and moderation to make things work. Losing trust in truthfulness may not matter as no one trusts politicians, but losing trust in competence is lethal.

How bitter all this feels to the troops on the ground. Most Labour councils have a story to tell. In London twice as many Labour councils have four-star ratings, with lower average council tax than the Tories or Lib Dems. Already where Labour has lost local elections, activists grind their teeth as they watch Tories and Lib Dems claim credit for new children's centres, rebuilt schools and hospitals, all delivered by a Labour government.

Labour MPs tremble at losing yet another great swath of council seats: local parties soon die without councillors, leaving few foot soldiers at the next election confronting armies of enemy councillors in every ward. So Labour supporters tempted to give Tony Blair a bloody nose by letting Tories in might consider the damage it may do in the long term. Emailers ask angrily how else they can express their fury. The answer again, I'm afraid, is that old nosepeg. Don't use good local Labour councillors to get your revenge on the PM. His MPs look determined to see him off this time, roughly if need be, should he be foolish enough not to go soon.